GABA is the abbreviation for the compound Gamma Amino Butyric Acid. GABA is an inhibitory neurotransmitter discovered in 1950. It is related to the amino acid, glutamic acid, a nutrient known to improve sleep. GABA reduces stress and helps the brain prepare for better sleep by activating brain receptors and calming nerves.

GABA stimulates the anterior pituitary gland and helps increase Human Growth Hormone (HGH). Body builders are known to take GABA for this reason. A study at the University of Milan showed that GABA supplementation induced a five-time increase of growth hormone into the blood stream.

GABA helps stabilize the theta waves of the brain. In a clinical trial in Japan, GABA was shown to increase alpha waves and decrease beta waves. GABA was tested against water (placebo) and L-theanine and only the GABA showed the change in brain wave activity.

At the end of the nerve is a sac. When stimulated, the sac releases neurotransmitters. These chemicals then help the nerve impulse to cross the space between the nerves, called the synapse. This is how nerves and brain tissue communicate. Neurotransmitters are responsible for most body functions, including emotions, movement and the ability to experience pain.

When the brain runs out of neurotransmitters, the signals between the nerves slow down. This is what happens under stress. Symptoms of a GABA deficiency include anxiety, low sex drive, headaches, heart palpitations, and even seizures. GABA affects epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease as well.

GABA is contained in many complex carbohydrates, such as pasta and grains. GABA can also be synthesized by the amino acid glutamine. Foods high in glutamine include bananas, halibut, lentils, oats, rice bran, walnuts, broccoli, beef liver, almonds, and spinach. Powdered glutamine can also be purchased as a nutritional supplement.

Two other amino acids have been shown to work with GABA to help its absorption. Taurine helps synthesize GABA. Both taurine and glycine are made in the body but can be supplemented to help with GABA production. Vitamin B6 is also needed for GABA synthesis. Taking the B vitamins as a complex is recommended.

The recommended dosage of GABA is 1000 to 2000 mg a day. GABA has difficulty crossing the brain/blood barrier, so vitamin companies are searching for other methods of delivery, for instance adding GABA to oil-based solutions. Other suggestions to aid absorption are to increase the precursors, taurine, glycine and glutamine, and let the body manufacture GABA itself.

Cooking is something we all take for granted but a new theory suggests that if we had not learned to cook food, not only would we still look like chimps but, like them, we would also be compelled to spend most of the day chewing. Without cooking, an average person would have to eat around five kilos of raw food to get enough calories to survive. The daily mountain of fruit and vegetables would mean a six-hour chewing marathon. It is already accepted that the introduction of meat into our ancestors’ diet caused their brains to grow and their intelligence to increase. Meat - a more concentrated form of energy - not only meant bigger brains for our ancestors, but also an end to the need to devote nearly all their time to foraging to maintain energy levels. As a consequence, more time was available for social structure to develop.

Harvard Professor Richard Wrangham believes there is more to it than simply discovering meat. He thinks that it is not so much a change in the ingredients of our diet, but the way in which we prepare them that has caused the radical evolution of our species. “I think cooking is arguably the biggest increase in the quality of the diet in the whole of the history of life,” he says. “Our ancestors most probably dropped food in fire accidentally. They would have found it was delicious and that set us off on a whole new direction.” To understand how and when our bodies changed, we need to take a closer look at what our ancestors ate by studying the fossil records.

Our earliest ancestor was the ape-like Australopithecus. Australopithecus had a large belly containing a big large-intestine, essential to digest the robust plant matter, and had large, flat teeth which it used for grinding and crushing tough vegetation. None the less, it was Australopithecus that moved out of the trees and onto the African savannah, and started to eat the animals that grazed there. And it was this change of habitat, lifestyle and diet that also prompted major changes in anatomy. The eating of meat ties in with an evolutionary shift 2.3 million years ago resulting in a more human-looking ancestor with sharper teeth and a 30% bigger brain, called Homo habilis.

The most momentous shift however, happened 1.8 million years ago when Homo erectus - our first “truly human” ancestor arrived on the scene. Homo erectus had an even bigger brain, smaller jaws and teeth. Erectus also had a similar body shape to us. Shorter arms and longer legs appeared, and gone was the large vegetable-processing gut, meaning that Erectus could not only walk upright, but could also run. He was cleverer and faster, and - according to Professor Wrangham - he had learned how to cook. “Cooking made our guts smaller,” he says. “Once we cooked our food, we didn’t need big guts. “They’re costly in terms of energy. Individuals that were born with small guts were able to save energy, have more babies and survive better.”

Professor Peter Wheeler from Liverpool John Moores University and his colleague, Leslie Aiello, think it was this change in our digestive system that specifically allowed our brains to get larger. Cooking food breaks down its cells, meaning that our stomachs need to do less work to liberate the nutrients our bodies need. This, says Wheeler, “freed up energy which could then be used to power a larger brain. The increase in brain-size mirrors the reduction in the size of the gut.” Significantly Wheeler and Aiello found that the reduction in the size of our digestive system was exactly the same amount that our brains grew by - 20%.

Professor Stephen Secor at the University of Alabama found that not only does cooked food release more energy, but the body uses less energy in digesting it. He uses pythons as a model for digestion as they stay still for up to six days while digesting a meal. This makes them the perfect model as the only energy they expend is on digestion. His research shows that pythons use 24% less energy digesting cooked meat, compared with raw. So being human might all be down to energy.

Cooking is essentially a form of pre-digestion, which has transferred energy use from our guts to our brains. According to Professors Wheeler and Wrangham and their colleagues, it is no coincidence that humans - the cleverest species on earth - are also the only species that cooks.

Research has shown that high levels of homocysteine in the blood can predict who will suffer a heart attack. High levels of homocysteine prevent dilation of blood vessels. Research showed that homocysteine levels were a better indicator of heart attacks and strokes than high cholesterol levels. The research on the amino acid homocysteine and heart disease is over ten years old. Following men with heart problems for six years, Norwegian researchers found that the higher the homocysteine levels, the greater the risk of death following a heart attack. Another study showed that the risk of a fatal heart attack increased four-fold in those with high homocysteine levels in the blood. Several nutrients have been shown to lower blood homocysteine and the associated risks.

The risk factor for other diseases also increases with elevated levels of homocysteine. Diseases such as gout, rheumatism, cancer, leukemia, kidney disease, lupus, and even depression, go up as the homocysteine levels rise. Some doctors suggest a link between homocysteine and the thyroid gland as a link to these non-vascular disease states.

A healthy level of homocysteine in the blood is below 15 micro mol/liter, but some doctors recommend levels below 7. A simple blood test can be used for diagnosis.

Nutrients that reduce homocysteine are B12, B9 (folic acid), B2 (riboflavin), and B6. These nutrients act through various chemical pathways to break down homocysteine in the blood. Adding zinc and Tri-methyl Glycine (TMG) to the diet is also recommended. Physical exercise will decrease homocysteine levels, as will losing weight and reducing stress. A vegetarian diet reduces homocysteine levels as well.